Sorry, this is a case of equal punishment for equal action.
OBL and him did the same thing.
Should the US be hypocritical by targeting OBL, but this guy gets a fair trial.

His citizenship was planned out, he father was here on a "student visa". Once he father was done, he went back to Yemen. This was a planned out sham from day 1.

You might want to take a look at what Al-Awlaki did.
He is not someone that a person dropped a dime on, he is right up there with OBL.
You make it sound as if Al-Awlaki was in a protest line.
Don't minimize it by making it sound as if this was a tip from a person trying to avoid a length prison sentence.

 

I agree with your statements. I still lean a bit toward Ron Paul.... (Not to be confused with RP). I think he "split the hair" a bit too carefully with this statement, but nobody is perfect.

 

I watched both of those clips and I'm not impressed. It seems that Ron Paul is very good at pointing to a problem but comes up a bit short on solutions. Alot like Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton. While I'd have to agree that maybe by a very fine line the citizenship is an an issue, the over all picture screams no it doesn't.

My view on this is the swat team had a clear shot and were given a green light to take out the perp. That happens very often right here on American soil, scum bags are scum bags period. It just happens that in this case we got the large economy size scum bag.

May his virgins all be fat and diseased, the world is a better place with him being gone.

 

Now that right there scares me John......I might have to re-think my position!

 

Either way, American citizen is an American citizen. Ethically speaking, we should have given OBL a trial (like we did for the *****, Hussein, etc). In the eyes of the rest of the world, we are projecting ourselves as the policemen of the world and that we are above human rights laws.

Iraq, Afghanistan, etc are not threats to us. They have little or no military, they do not have the capability to fire long range nuclear missles, and they are only killing Americans because we continue to send troops at them. OBL and Al-Awlaki were not any more a threat to us than our own government. If a country was bombing our factories and our hospitals, wouldn't you be a little pissed off and want to rally your troops and threaten that country with violence if they didn't stop? The 9/11 commission itself points towards our foreign policy as the reason for those attacks. At this point, it is almost like we want the middle east to tear itself apart, so we kill off a couple countries and then fund their enemies so that they're too busy fighting each other, maybe they'll forget about us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1FFVWEQnSM

 

first of all, your example is not the same. the swat team taking down a perp who poses an immediate threat to human life is different than someone who is a member of an organization that may or may not plan to do something.

secondly, he has the answers.

instead of bailing out wall street, we let the banks fail and let capitalism run its course.

instead of fighting endless wars in Iraq, etc, we bring the troops home to protect our home front, we stop sending out foreign aid, and worry about our own problems.

we stabilize the currency by introducing a stable, commodity backed currency to limit / eliminate the foul play of the fed and others.

we shift the burden of health care, welfare, etc to the states and let them decide how to handle those programs, as it is expressly designated by the constitution.

introduce tax reforms that will be not only fair to all citizens but legal under the constitution.


these are all very simple principles.

 

Hey J, I remember a wise man once said, (and I paraphrase).. "We might be closer to the same position than you think"!

 

OBL was not a policeman of the world, it was an indication that the US is not going to stand for being attacked.
Al-Awlaki proved the point, don't care where you hide it is gong to happen. Yemen don't like it, don't harbor terrorists that attack us.

I am not going to feel 1 bit bad for Al-Awlaki or OBL. Attack us, the US is going to go eye for an eye. This is a rule terrorists understand.
His dad was playing legal games, to give his son a chance to go somewhere else to hide. If he was serious about his son having a trial, he should have negotiated bringing him in. He was using the ACLU to help his son continue to commit these acts.

You seem to be a bit confused about why we are in Iraq & Afghanistan.
We are going after the terrorists that are there, not the population and not because Iraq is going to attack us some day.

You seem be be a bit confused why terrorists come after the US.
Major items
1. The US is in Islamic countries, the Taliban and Al-Qaeda feel this is invading their country. Does not matter if the govt of say Egypt wants the US there, the terrorists are making that decision on their own. The same as me attacking you for living on the same block as your next door neighbor. I don't care if you get along with him and he wants you there, I don't think you should be there.
2. The Western world is a thread to their way of life. This was a big Taliban item, that after the Soviet union left town, the Taliban kicked into high gear and locked the place down.

Huh ? You have got to be kidding me, OBL was not a threat to the US ?
Where have you been since 1995 ? Started out bombing trucks in Saudi Arabia, then a few embassies, the Cole and one other thing. How do you figure OBL was not a threat to the US ? Do you think he was not part of this ?
Libya even had him on their wanted list.

This is correct, providing funding to Israel is a problem to Terrorists that are Islamic based. Having military bases in the middle east, and really our way of life is an issue to them. Don't forget this includes countries in the PacRim.
Too late for the US to change this. These Terrorists organizations fired up, and made new rules.

I find it rather shocking that you thought OBl was not a threat to the US, but with this as your opinion, it is no wonder you think what happened to Al-Awlaki was wrong.
Support these 2 all you wish, that is the great thing about being free, not under rule or pressured rule of the Taliban.

 

Alwaki was on the wanted dead or alive list, his own father knew this and I guarantee you he knew this too, If he wanted a fair trial he should have and could have turned himself in. I guarantee you if I was living in Yemen , as a US citizen , and I found out my homeland had me on a wanted dead or alive list and I knew i didnt do anything wrong I guarantee you Id be on the horn trying to sort things out not hiding waiting for the missile to hit. Especially after they just toasted OBL. Guilty as charged American citizen or not.

 

Osama was not a US citizen.

 

OK, same question as above :
Should the US be hypocritical by targeting OBL, but Al-Awlaki gets a fair trial ?

What message is that going to send to the world ?

Al-Awlaki's dad was trying to use the ACLU ( et all ) to give his son time to hide somewhere else.
If he was not, why not negotiate a surrender to the ICC, and let him have a trial in the Hague ? This would be a trial, same as Saddam H got.

Al-Awlaki was just as much ( if not more ) of a treat to the US as OBL, due to his understanding of western culture and how he used it against the US. In 10 years Al-Awlaki would have made OBL look like an amateur.

 

I really can't believe this discussion is going on. I guess it goes to show that people in the US really are out of touch with what is going on in the world. Ladies and gentlemen we are at war. We are at war with an enemy that has no state. We are at war with an enemy that is not going to stop until they meet their objectives. We are at war with an enemy that is fighting based on their theological beliefs, not secular ideas. We are at war with warriors, not criminals. You do not treat combatants as criminals, period. We have not in the past stood by idly while our service members were treated as criminals by foreign powers. We did not submit our warriors to the authority of the world court. Al-Awlaki, decided to align himself with the forces we are fighting against. As such he was terminated like any other combatant. He wasn't in downtown Dallas protesting, or working to expand the influence of radical Islamic clerics in the US. He was an active leader in the organization that declared war against us. He is a legal combatant and as such he is a legal target to termination.

 

I agree with everything you said in your post 1depd, and I only wanted to change your word "legal" to "enemy".

You did hit the nail on the head. The "enemy" is not a "state". But, it is what our military is fighting. If we had tried to bring him in for a trial, as some have suggested, we would have put our people in harm's way, for no just reason. Additionally, the difficulty in mounting such an operation in a foreign country to apprehend a fleeting, non-stationary target such as this almost assuredly dooms it to failure.

One more thing. This man was a "dual citizen". He was born in the US to Yemeni parents, which made him, by accident of birth a US citizen. He was also a Yemeni citizen, and I think his actions clearly show his allegiance was not with this Country. He was "siding with the enemy".

So in summation, I feel he is nothing more or less than a "wartime casualty". And, good riddance.

- Jack

 

Whether we are at war or not makes no difference.

Sure, this guy was a scumbag. But every American citizen is guaranteed certain rights. And some of those rights are we are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Also, we are guaranteed a fair and speedy trial.

I don't care if we suspected him of tearing down the WTC. He should've stood trial for his crimes, and if found guilty been put to death.

Our Constitution is all that separates us from dictatorships/3rd world countries. If we continue to play fast and loose with the Constitution, we are doomed. It's not a matter of if, but when.

 

Whether we are at war or not makes all the difference in the world. If the Al Qaida organization had not declared war on us and operated as a military, then I agree Al-Awlaki was nothing more than a criminal terrorist and the legal justice system should have been brought to bear, like it was during the 70's and 80's. The organization he sided with was operating as a military and has stated goals of a military organization, so he gave up his rights to a speedy trial, much like the soldiers and leaders of the Confederate army did on the battlefields in the 1860's.